A new era for the Changelog Podcast Universe (News)
Dec 9, 2024
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Exciting changes are coming to the podcast network in 2025, aimed at enhancing the listener experience. A critique of a popular Stanford study on ghost engineers reveals it may not be as groundbreaking as believed. Discover Git ingest, a tool that simplifies codebase access from GitHub repositories. Simon Willison shares valuable insights from his time at Lanyrd and Eventbrite, while Matheus Lima outlines mistakes new managers often make, including issues like delegation and imposter syndrome.
The Changelog podcast is shifting its focus for 2025, discontinuing some shows to prioritize changelog news and enhance engagement.
Simon Willison emphasizes the need for accurate event time storage, recommending the retention of original user inputs to prevent misunderstandings.
Deep dives
Wikipedia's Deaths Page Dominates Traffic
The topic of mortality captured significant attention, with the Wikipedia page for deaths in 2024 receiving over 44 million views, showcasing a fascination with such content among users. This marks the fifth time in nine years that a deaths page has outperformed all other content on the platform, highlighting the morbid curiosity prevalent in society. This trend raises questions about why people are drawn to this information and what it reveals about cultural attitudes toward death. The high traffic indicates a willingness to engage with such topics, prompting discussions on the implications of this phenomenon.
Key Changes in Podcast Programming
The podcast is undergoing significant shifts as it prepares for 2025, with plans to focus solely on producing changelog news, interviews, and related content. As a result, the production of several other shows, including GoTime and JS Party, will be discontinued, despite ongoing spinoff plans for fans of those formats. The decision was made to create more space for new experiments and exploration in coding, which was identified as a necessary evolution for the podcast’s future direction. This strategy aims to enhance the overall listening experience and engagement for developers and tech enthusiasts.
Best Practices for Storing Event Times
The importance of accurately storing event times was highlighted by Simon Willison, who drew from his experiences at Lanyard and Eventbrite. He emphasized that understanding the user's intent when they designate a time for an event is critical, as errors in this area can lead to user frustration and missed events. Willison noted that while storing time in UTC has its merits, it can complicate future events due to variable factors such as time zones and user errors. His recommendation was to maintain the original time inputted by users to prevent confusion during event edits, ensuring clarity and accuracy in event management.
Common Mistakes for New Engineering Managers
Mateos Lima shared insights on the common pitfalls faced by new engineering managers, emphasizing the transition from individual contributor to management. He identified six major mistakes, including reluctance to delegate and mismanaging perceptions within the team. Each error could lead to challenges in team dynamics and personal effectiveness, impacting overall success in the new role. Lima’s reflections serve to guide those navigating similar career shifts, highlighting the shared experiences across the engineering management landscape.
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Transformations in the Changelog Podcast Network and Insights on Software Engineering
We’re making some big Changelog changes in 2025, the previously featured Stanford study on ghost engineers doesn’t live up to the hype, Git ingest is a simple service that turns any GitHub repository into a simple text ingest of its codebase, Simon Willison dishes out some hard-earned wisdom he acquired by working at Lanyrd / Eventbrite & Matheus Lima warns us about six mistakes that new managers make.
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